NHS queue jumping...

[DafferDill]

DM had to have an ultrasound, rushed through by her GP.

She was told it was a 2 week wait, unless she paid £70, in which case she could be seen the next day.

She opted for the latter and was seen on the dot, which is unusual for the hospital.

She was in two minds whether to pay as it felt wrong in principle, but obviously was incredibly worried...

Aibu to think this two tier system within the NHS is pretty appalling?

5littlefrogs as you can see from my post how private work does affect the availability if Nhs staff. I'm happy to help with private work, they pay more, but then I think oh I'll not do any extra work for the nhs as I'm busy doing things at home. If there was no offer of private work...id be tempted by the offer of extra work with the nhs. Replicate that up and down the county.

It's only a problem if she has broken her principles to pay - in which case, it is hypocritical, however worried about her health she is -otherwise, as PP have said, she's simply taken a private slot. This is absolutely nothing new - it's been happening since at least the 1950s, and has nothing to do with either the Tory government (no matter what some PP have claimed ) or, indeed, the massive black hole that is the NHS budget.

The NHS won't pay overtime. They won't even pay for the overtime that doctors and nurses are already working.

In the department I used to work in there were 3 consultants with a part time secretary each. Now there are 5 consultants and 2 part time secretaries shared between them. Everybody works overtime unpaid.

There is plenty of work to justify all those people working full time and being paid for their actual hours - but it will never happen.

It's probably the private work paying for the equipment. A bank bought an Edinburgh hospital an MRI scanner a few years back, the only proviso was its employees got priority. The purists were up in arms about it, the medics and patients were a bit more sensible.

It was in the same hospital with the same staff though.

Yep but it is still private.

I've done tests on private patients in an NHS hospital, sometimes paid extra if it was done out of hours, usually the money just went to the department though.

Have worked in both NHS and private - in private you can be expected to work evenings and eekends but the patient is charged extra.

The NHS often won't pay for any overtime so lots of departments close or do limited hours outside 9-5 Mon - Fri. So at 5.30pm the department might close and every one goes home, or they stay for an hour and do a couple of tests on private patients and get an hour's overtime.

Some NHS hospitals have entire private wards.

The NHS is largely being run by private companies now on a profit basis It always has been, GP's, dentists, opticians, pharmacists, drug companies, equipment suppliers - all private companies profiting from NHS money from (nealry) day 1.

I would never blame someone for paying for a test privately TBH. My friend had spent 4 years being fobbed off by her GP and was becoming more and more ill. Eventually she paid for a private consultation and had some investigations including bronchoscopy and MRI. The consultant she saw privately was so horrified by the results that he phoned the GP and got her pushed her into his NHS clinic as an urgent referral.

After getting some treatment, she has improved a lot, but the lung damage she has will always be significant.

My mother did the same thing for me 12 years ago, when I was a teen, because we knew from previous experience I have a very high pain threshold (that's not anything to boast about btw - threshold and tolerance are unrelated). Then it turned out I needed emergency surgery - as in same day - and if we'd waited I would have died. So the doctor who did the scan and surgery didn't charge - he also worked NHS. Yet if we hadn't been able to offer to pay, I probably wouldn't be here. 2 tier healthcare is nothing new.

I'm part time. So they do have to pay me another day if I work another day. Private pay more so I do that instead of working Nhs.

Sounds like the VIP passes at Alton Towers etc - subsidises the other patients but the number of VIP customers only ever grows until most of us are paying and the advantage is eroded.

We then pay more to be on the VVIP list.

DH has jumped a tonne of queues in the last month or so, all on the NHS. When there are red flags stuff moves very fast - next day ct scan, biopsy 2 days later... actually pretty scary!

private hospitals take NHS patients too....it shortens waiting lists, and the NHS pay for the patient to be treated ....when you are having elective surgery you will get a 'choice ' of where you will be treated...its not privatising the NHS its giving patients choices.....paying £70 for a scan is a bargain....its not queue jumping, its a choice....she didnt have to pay

Yes - I was thinking Legoland Q-bot... Of course this has gone on forever, it's just that more and more people now feel the need for it, but we are supposed to pretend it's the same old, same old, not worse and worse and more and more people feeling the need to do it. We can't have a low tax economy and a fully functioning NHS.

They do send you to private if you want sooner, when i wanted travel injections which were free on the NHS they told me I can wait a week or go private and pay £100.
I didn't even end up getting any injections in the end because they refused to give them to me based on the fact i was leaving the country in a few days after the appointment

We paid for a scan for my daughter. It was at the local hospital and the normal staff but it was at 5 pm and their NHS shift had ended so the fee paid the radiographer for staying on for half an hour and the rest went into hospital funds for the use of the machine. I thought it was a good use of resources and didn't mean any NHS patient missed out and the hospital got some money.

We've seen the same consultant as an NHS patient and a private patient.

Me too.